NUMERALS
1, wꜥ; 2, śn; 3, ḫmt; 4, fdw; 5, dw’; 6, sis (or sw’ ?); 7, sfḫ; 8, ḫmn; 9, psḏ; 10, mt. 2, 6, 7, 8 and 9 (?) resemble Semitic numerals. 20 and 30 (mꜥb) had special names; 40-90 were named as if plurals of the units 4-9, as in Semitic. 100, šnt; 1000, ḫ’; 10,000, zbꜥ; 100,000, ḥfnw.
VERBS
The forms observable in hieroglyphic writing lead to the following classification:—
| Strong Verbs. | Biliteral | Often showing traces of an original III. inf.; in early times very rare. | |
| Triliteral | Very numerous. | ||
|
Generally formed by reduplication. In Late Egyptian they were no longer inflected, and were conjugated with the help of ỉry, “do.” | ||
| Weak Verbs. | II. geminatae | Properly triliterals, but, with the 2nd or 3rd radical alike, these coalesced in many forms where no vowel intervened, and gave the word the appearance of a biliteral. | |
| III. gem. | Rare. | ||
| III. inf. | Numerous. III. w, and III. ỉ were unified early. Some very common verbs, “do,” “give,” “come,” “bring” are irregular. | ||
| IV. inf. | Partly derived from adjectival formations in y, from nouns and infinitives:—e.g. ś·ỉp, inf. śỉpt; adj. śỉpty; verb (4 lit.), śỉpty. |
Many verbs with weak consonants—Iy, Iw, II. inf. (m[w]t), and those with א—are particularly difficult to trace accurately, owing to defective writing.
It seems that all the above classes may be divided into two main groups, according to the form of the infinitive:—with masculine infinitive the strong triliteral type, and with feminine infinitive the type of the III. inf. The former group includes all except III. inf., IV. inf., and the causative of the biliterals, which belong to the second group.
It is probable that the verb had a special form denoting condition, as in Arabic. There was a causative form prefixing ś, and traces of forms resembling Pi‘el and Niphal are observed. Some roots are reduplicated wholly or in part with a frequentative meaning, and there are traces of gemination of radicals.
Pseudo-Participle.—In very early texts this is the past indicative, but more commonly it is used in sentences such as, gm-n-f wỉ ꜥḥꜥ·kwỉ, “he found me I stood,” i.e. “he found me standing.” The indicative use was soon given up and the pseudo-participle was employed only as predicate, especially indicating a state; e.g. ntr·t šm·tỉ, “the goddess goes”; ỉw-k wḏ’·tỉ, “thou art prosperous.” The endings were almost entirely lost in New Egyptian. For early times they stand thus:—
| Sing. | 3. | masc. | ỉ, late w. | Dual wỉỉ. | Pl. | w. | |||
| fem. | tỉ. | tỉỉw | tỉ. | ||||||
| 2. | masc. | tỉ | tỉwny. | ||||||
| fem. | tỉ | ||||||||
| 1. | c. | kwỉ. | wyn. |
The pseudo-participle seems, by its inflexion, to have been the perfect of the original Semitic conjugation. The simplest form being that of the 3rd person, it is best arranged like the corresponding tense in Semitic grammars, beginning with that person. There is no trace of the Semitic imperfect in Egyptian. The ordinary conjugation is formed quite differently. The verbal stem is here followed by the subject-suffix or substantive—śḏm-f, “he hears”; śḏmw śtn, “the king hears.” It is varied by the addition of particles, &c., n, ỉn, ḫr, tw, thus:—
śḏm-f, “he hears”; śḏm-w-f, “he is heard” (pl. śḏm-ỉỉ-śn, “they are heard”); śḏm-tw-f, “he is heard”; śḏm-n-f, “he heard”; śḏm-n-tw-f, “he was heard”; also, śḏm-ỉn-f, śḏm-ḫr-f, śḏm-k’-f. Each form has special uses, generally difficult to define, śdm-f seems rather to be imperfect, śḏm-n-f perfect, and generally to express the past. Later, śḏm-f is ordinarily expressed by periphrases; but by the loss of n, śḏm-n-f became itself sdm-f, which is the ordinary past in demotic. Coptic preserves śḏm-f forms of many verbs in its causative (e.g. ⲧⲁⲛϧⲟϥ “cause him to live,” from Egyptian di·t·nḫ-f), and, in its periphrastic conjugation, the same forms of wn, “be,” and ỉry, “do.” With śḏm-f (śeḏmo-f) was a more emphatic form (eśḏomef), at any rate in the weak verbs.
The above, with the relative forms mentioned below, are supposed by Erman to be derived from the participle, which is placed first for emphasis: thus, śḏm·w śtn, “hearing is the king”; śḏm-f, for śḏm-fy, “hearing he is.” This Egyptian paraphrase of Semitic is just like the Irish paraphrase of English, “It is hearing he is.”
The imperative shows no ending in the singular; in the plural it has y, and later w; cf. Semitic imperative.
The infinitive is of special importance on account of its being preserved very fully in Coptic. It is generally of masculine form, but feminine in iii. inf. (as in Semitic), and in causatives of biliterals.
There are relative forms of śḏm-f and śḏm-n-f, respectively śḏm·w-f (masc.), śḏm·t-n-f (fem.), &c. They are used when the relative is the object of the relative sentence, or has any other position than the subject. Thus śḏm·t-f may mean “she whom he hears,” “she who[se praises] he hears,” “she [to] whom he hears [someone speaking],” &c. There are close analogies between the function of the relative particles in Egyptian and Semitic; and the Berber languages possess a relative form of the verb.
Participles.—These are active and passive, perfect and imperfect, in the old language, but all are replaced by periphrases in Coptic.
Verbal Adjectives.—There is a peculiar formation, śḏm·ty-fy, “he who shall hear,” probably meaning originally “he is a hearer,” śḏm·ty being an adjective in y formed from a feminine (t) form of the infinitive, which is occasionally found even in triliteral verbs; the endings are: sing., masc. ty-fy, fem. ty-śy; pl., masc. ty-śn, fem. ty-śt. It is found only in Old Egyptian.
Particles.—There seems to be no special formation for adverbs, and little use is made of adverbial expressions. Prepositions, simple and compound, are numerous. Some of the commonest simple prepositions are n “for,” r “to,” m “in, from,” ḥr “upon.” A few enclitic conjunctions exist, but they are indefinite in meaning—śwt a vague “but,” grt a vague “moreover,” &c.
Coptic presents a remarkable contrast to Egyptian in the precision of its periphrastic conjugation. There are two present tenses, an imperfect, two perfects, a pluperfect, a present and a past frequentative, and three futures besides future perfect; there are also conjunctive and optative forms. The negatives of some of these are expressed by special prefixes. The gradual growth of these new forms can be traced through all the stages of Egyptian. Throughout the history of the language we note an increasing tendency to periphrasis; but there was no great advance towards precision before demotic. In demotic there are distinguishable a present tense, imperfect, perfect, frequentative, future, future perfect, conjunctive and optative; also present, past and future negatives, &c. The passive was extinct before demotic; demotic and Coptic express it, clumsily it must be confessed, by an impersonal “they,” e.g. “they bore him” stands for “he was born.”
It is worth noting how, in other departments besides the verb, the Egyptian language was far better adapted to practical ends during and after the period of the Deltaic dynasties (XXII.-XXX.) than ever it was before. It was both simplified and enriched. The inflexions rapidly disappeared and little was left of the distinctions between masculine and feminine, singular, dual and plural—except in the pronouns. The dual number had been given up entirely at an earlier date. The pronouns, both personal and demonstrative, retained their forms very fully. As prefixes, suffixes and articles, they, together with some auxiliary verbs, provided the principal mechanism of the renovated language. An abundant supply of useful adverbs was gradually accumulated, as well as conjunctions, so far as the functions of the latter were not already performed by the verbal prefixes. These great improvements in the language correspond to great changes in the economic condition of the country; they were the result of active trade and constant intercourse of all classes of Egyptians with foreigners from Europe and Asia. Probably the best stage of Egyptian speech was that which immediately preceded Coptic. Though Coptic is here and there more exactly expressive than the best demotic, it was spoilt by too much Greek, duplicating and too often expelling native expressions that were already adequate for its very simple requirements. Above all, it is clumsily pleonastic.
The Writing
The ancient Egyptian system of writing, so far as we know, originated, developed and finally expired strictly within the limits of the Nile Valley. The germ of its existence may have come from without, but, as we know it, it is essentially Egyptian and intended for the expression of the Egyptian language. About the 1st century B.C., however, the semi-barbarous rulers of the Ethiopian kingdoms of Meroe and Napata contrived the “Meroitic” alphabet, founded on Egyptian writing, and comprising both a hieroglyphic and a cursive form (see Ethiopia). As yet both of these kinds of Nubian writing are undeciphered. Egyptian hieroglyphic was carried by conquest into Syria, certainly under the XVIIIth Dynasty, and again under the XXVIth for the engraving of Egyptian inscriptions; but in the earlier period the cuneiform syllabary, and in the later the “Phoenician” alphabet, had obtained a firm hold there, and we may be sure that no attempt was made to substitute the Egyptian system for the latter. Cuneiform tablets in Syria, however, seem almost confined to the period of the XVIIIth Dynasty. Although it cannot be proved it seems quite possible that the traders of Phoenicia and the Aegean adopted the papyrus and Egyptian hieratic writing together, before the end of the New Kingdom, and developed their “Phoenician” alphabet from the latter about 1000 B.C. In very early times a number of systems of writing already
